If you have ever been curious to feel lines clearly drawn between “us” and “them,” then by all means don’t pass up any opportunity to attend a Barack Obama health care town-hall meeting rally. I was privileged to join eight other Moabites and countless others in Grand Junction Saturday for a quintessential American experience.

Oh what a joy to walk into a grinning swaying mass of Democrats (after walking past the angry “other side” and getting yelled at), and to know absolutely who your people are.

Wow, what fun to stand in front, waving your sign to blaring James Brown, and to get the chant going yourself: “O-BA-MA! O-BA-MA! O-BA-MA!”

Indescribable thrill when the crowd suddenly gets excited and you follow their gaze and there is Air Force One passing right over your head!

And what a long overdue satisfaction to finally be cheering for your president, one who you and all the strangers around you trust so completely, and who we all elected. You have to stand there, laughing like crazy, while the angry mob on the other side waves written threats (”If the First Amendment doesn’t work, I’ll try the Second”), and yells worse right at all of us, who can’t help
dancing and ululating, a big happy mob. When we felt really precocious, we would yell into the din: “We’re having more fun than you are!”

LUCY WALLINGFORD
Moab, Utah

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